


Lycopersicon esculentum

by powerdragonmoon



Category: Miraculous Ladybug
Genre: Alternate Universe - Witchcraft, Happy Halloween!, Oops, SOMEONE TAKE ALL THESE AUs AWAY FROM ME, Witchcraft, halloween oneshot that turned into a multishot, minimal tags cause i dont know whats happening here..., will update once we figure this out XD, witch!AU
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-10-31
Updated: 2018-01-07
Packaged: 2019-01-27 04:44:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,226
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12573984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/powerdragonmoon/pseuds/powerdragonmoon
Summary: The life and times of Chloe Bourgeois, witch extraordinaire. The air whispers wishes in her ear, yet she listens to her own sound. The stars map out her stories and instead she decides to create her own. Until unwittingly, the line between fate and choice blur into one.





	1. Hallowed and Hollow

**Author's Note:**

  * For [across_galaxies](https://archiveofourown.org/users/across_galaxies/gifts), [Measuredinlove](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Measuredinlove/gifts), [Yilena](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Yilena/gifts).



> A small idea for a Halloween oneshot that grew into something more...

She remembers what the tea leaves had said, the glints of light reflected off crystal, the lines on her hands. Every reading that took place all those years ago when she was just a student learning her trade, young, carefree and wild. Each one repeated over and over, each one with the same result.

Grow, they said. Soil and dirt, they whispered. And she shudders at the thought of getting her hands dirty. Weed, prune, plant, water. Care and nurture. Words her tongue could not properly give meaning to…and colours that held too much meaning.

Red.

Lots and lots of red.

In her eyes she saw work, toil, and stress. In her premonitions she felt pain, pain from the past and pain in her future. And so she ignored the summons, instead finding better uses of her time and magic. Foliage flashed into glitter and red bled into glamour. She worked hard, but it was work that came with an ease that was comfortable to her and held little to no challenge. Even better, it came with glory and praise…fanfare and celebrity.  

That soon morphed into monotony.

Still, she watches as the years passed, she delves deeper and deeper into her studies, her performance. She tries to blaze trails of her own making, yet still falters in trying to join the crowd. All around she looks on as others found their place. Their familiars step out from uncharted realms: wandering stray cats that purr in the presence of those they protect, songbirds that tweet and twitter from tree to tree and shoulder to shoulder; shadows that lurk, watching over their chosens.

In the ghosts of her reflection she finds no one by her side…

The whispers get louder, the visions clearer and clearer.

Now, when she closes her eyes she sees flowers. When her hands reach for a quill, she feels the grit of soil. Each spell that is cast grows dimmer and dimmer.

She is tired.

There is a void in her heart that even magic doesn’t seem able to fill. No sparkle of glitter or flash of white can quell the emptiness. Glinted gold is just a outer coat, hiding the hollowness, masking the abyss. Superficial.

When she reads her own palms, she sees leaves and petals in each line.

It is draining.

But she is stubborn and she continues on.

When she passes the shop, her feet seem to drag her in unwillingly, even as she glares at its tacky pink sign. However she is soon under the spell of colours and blooms, in a room overflowing in green and filled with scents of a thousand unseen worlds. Her annoyance is quickly smothered by wonder, complete awe as she stands enamoured in the flora—

That is until a bee buzzes in her ear.

She yelps, breaking the spell and swatting at the annoying insect. In her surprise, she knocks against a nearby counter, sending a potted plant to the ground.

With a flick of her wrist, she casts some magic that just barely catches the plant, but it still knocks harshly against the floor, sending a horrible crack along the ceramic. Chloe flinches at the sound. She floats the plant back atop the counter to inspect the damage and grimaces at the nasty gash on its side…she was never good at healing spells.

Nearby, a black cat meows. In response Chloe glares at it. The cat is shiny and black as night. Its fur sparkles in the sunlight like stars she does not know the astrology of. A long tail puffs out behind it, shifting from side to side and Chloe purses her lips, silently wanting to remedy the situation before anyone noticed. She hopes this cat keeps its mouth shut. But its continued whining says otherwise.

The cat meows once more, this time louder, jumping from its ledge where it had previously been bathing in the sunlight to advance towards her. Its bright green eyes glow as it passes through the shade cast by the towering leaves.

“Shoo!” Chloe waves at it, before bristling at the sound of a door opening. She looks up across the counter to see a walking pile of flowers.

“Mon Minou?” the flowers speak, petals and leaves shaking slightly as they move forward into the shop. Chloe cranes her neck spotting a pink apron between the foliage, small hands wrapped around stems, and bare legs peeping out from below, slightly off balance.

The cat purrs, following the voice and rubbing itself against the owner’s legs.

Chloe steps back, feeling as if she is suddenly interrupting an oddly intimate moment. The shivers down her spine tell her she did not belong. She needs to escape.

However, it was then and there that her extravagant heels decide to voice otherwise. They clang against the tile flooring, sending an echoing cacophony throughout the previously peaceful flower shop.

The leaves shake, and the air grows heavier. Shadows weigh into her bones before she jumps in fright at an unseen touch. Vines wrap around her being, freezing her and she chokes on words stuck in her throat. The light dims. Spells lay dormant under her skin, her glitz and glamour lay useless, camouflaged by the rising walls of invasive weeds.

_Dark magic._

Chloe gasps one final breath as she feels the floor melt underneath her. Gravity takes its hold on her as she feels her being break into bits and pieces, each molecule ripped and cracked into stardust. Each particle becoming smaller than the last, yet limitless in its own expanding galaxy. Endless, yet finite. The weight of eternity presses down against her heart and she succumbs to its burden, falling boundless yet chained, captive yet freed, into the pits of a thousand black holes.

Until something snapped…wicked and wild.

Haunted and terrifying…

And bright.

 

 


	2. Seeds

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Flowers and magic fill the shop and Chloe finds herself in a black hole.

Chloe gasps, her eyes flashing wild. Her soul echoes through galaxies and she feels like her body is falling through the monstrous voids of a black hole, only to find herself landing back on her feet, in the same humble flower shop moments later. And just as fast as the sudden passing of shadows through her being, she is greeted by a light, a star, a wonder.

It fills her with warmth where before she was cold. It’s blindingly bright, where before she was shrouded in darkness. It heals, pulling the broken pieces of her back in place—or as best as they can be with so many pieces missing.

Time is a game, stretching out vast and flashing by in the blink of an eye. It’s tricks crackle against her skin as she finds her bearings, glancing around the surrounding foliage and back to the front counter.

A black cat stares at her.

She glares.

This flower shop is cursed, she can feel it, their is an ooze of magic that falls from each leaf, that trickles from the ground up. She eyes the cat, not with curiosity, but with suspicion.

The cat meows back at her and she bristles.

“Miss?”

Chloe remains stuck staring into the bright green eyes of the cat. Absently, she hums in response to the clouded call.

“Miss?” the voice echoes. Chloe can feel her inner instincts flare as the black cat stares her down. Her golden manicure flash metallic, elongating and ready to sting.

“Are you alright?” the echo asks, and Chloe jumps at the spark of a soft hand on hers. It’s too warm and she boils. She feels that familiar draining of her magic, and it feels like sand between her fingers, falling away like sand in a hourglass. She’s lost in this world of petals and leaves.

She looks up to blue. Blue eyes full of concern and pity, framed by dark hair pulled into pigtails, and her cheeks are speckled in a mixture of freckles and dirt. Chloe recoils at the touch, her chin held high despite the creaking of her bones.

“Oh, I’m sorry…” and she draws her hand back with a smile. “I was just asking, if you were looking for anything in particular?” She was probably around the same age as Chloe, but her demeanour left Chloe feeling old, it makes her feel the layers of makeup on her skin, the tenseness of her shoulders, and the frailty of her magic.

She tells herself its the pigtails.

“Something is missing…” The shopkeeper grabs her hand, flipping it over and reading her lines.

Chloe glances up at the witch with confusion, surprised at the action and to see the comment was directed at her. She closes her hand and rips it out from the odd woman’s grasp.

“Excuse me?” Chloe asks with annoyance. She wants to leave.

“Here,” the witch flares her hand out in the air, circling and curling her fingers with such ease and grace, that Chloe finds herself equally awed and offended at such an action. Magic blooms and sparkles as a light forms into something in her hand. “Plant these with love, with thoughts of magnanimity, and your perils will be answered.”

Chloe stares blankly the offering. The witch holds out a small silk bag, and this time curiosity gets to her and she quickly takes it, not really focused on the words spoken to her, but the intrigue of a gift.

The bag is soft and the fabric feels rich and of high quality, which surprises her. It’s just small enough to fit in the palm of her hand and feels almost empty with how light it is.

Untying the red ribbons with ease, Chloe opens the pouch, only to stare down at a cluster...of small seeds?

Her hand almost fists angrily around the pouch, her nails sharpen but she resists, smiling tightly at the shop keeper. The cat on the counter looks to have lost interest and is now sleeping.

The illusion is broken and Chloe almost wants to laugh at the thought that this shop could be anything special. She is sick, Chloe tells herself, and she needs magic, not flowers.

Without a word, she turns to leave, pausing briefly at the sleeping cat, that’s now softly purring on the counter. She glares daggers at it before exiting the shop.

“Have a nice day!” Chloe hears the the flourist chirp before the door swings to a close.

 

* * *

 

Inside the flower shop, the shopkeeper’s bright smile falters. She turns to the black cat on the counter before reaching out a soft hand. His purr intensifies before she even touches him and her smile comes back, just this time a bit smaller as she ponders. The cat blinks his eyes up at her as she pats his head.

“That wasn’t very nice,” she whispers to her companion, who seems utterly in rapture by the movement of her hand behind his ears. His eyes slowly blink at her before closing once more. “No more using cataclysm on customers.”

The purr wavers for a moment as the chat opens one eye at her, slightly sheepish at the disappointment dripping from the woman’s voice. He brings a paw up to his face before rolling comfortably on his back, exposing his belly to her.

“Ugh, you’re incorrigible” she says, but even with his eyes closed and above the reverberations of his heart, the cat can hear the laughter caught in her throat, he imagines her smile and pushes his head lazily against her palm, completely caught under her charm.

She scratches at his chin and his purr only grows. The afternoon sun that warmed the shop is quickly covered in clouds, but neither seem to mind as rain splashes against the window, pattering a gentle beat to soundtrack their day. And when he breathes, he breathes in the scent of flowers, of leaves, of rain, of dirt, and the magic of her.

It’s nice…these peaceful moments like this, and together they could be lost in their own world for forever.

When her hand moves to rub the fur of his belly, the moment is snapped. Its impulse and far beyond his control, but in a flash of lightning, his paw strikes, claws out as he bats her hand away.

“Ow! Adrien!”

 

* * *

 

Chloe leaves the shop, her heels sound against the cobblestone at the intensity and anger of her walk, only to become even more annoyed at the sudden change in weather. Rain threatens her hair but she casts a small protection charm to shield herself.

She carries on with her day, shopping and browsing nearby shops and quickly forgetting about the seeds. They sit in her purse forgotten until the next morning when she’s switching out bags to go with her outfit. Her hands touch the unfamiliar texture of silk and she’s brought back to the flower shop from the day before.

Without a second thought, she throws the drops the pouch back into her bag that she won’t be using today, not even bothering to throw it in the garbage. As she walks out the door she reminds herself that the next time she needs to use her white and gold purse from the latest spring collection that she will throw the pouch away and its contents out the window, along with any hopes of finding the poison that eats away at her being.

Instead the bag goes untouched for weeks, along with the pouch within.

 

 


End file.
